Lazy Fern in ACTION!

What can we say



What a great track



What a great race



What a great day



What a great bunch of supporters



May the digging continue long into the future

In late December 2005 strange thrashing and grunting noises were heard from the bush above South Kaori Stream. Wild pigs? Blind mountain bikers? Exploring botanists? Nope, it was the first of many exploration trips to find a suitable route for the proposed easy downhill track. Two years later, and the last ten metres of the track has just been built!

Two years (almost), 2773 hours (at least), 1965 metres of track (approximate), 300 volunteers (bloody awesome!).

On Wednesday night (5th December) the last ten metres was built, new signs were posted at the top, and a general track check was completed to remove any dodgy branches or stumps. Lazy Fern is now rideable all the way down thanks to the Wednesday crew of ...Murray, Mike, Karyn, Ian, Jonathan, Bronnie, Reece , Don, Mark, Clair, Aidan, Kirstyn, Phil, Hugh, Sasha, Oli, Dean, Alex, Anne-Louise, Trevor, Colin, Shane, Andrew and John.Most of us rode down it after the work party last night. Very satisfying:-)A few extra notes:

1. Last month WCC contractors finished building a long retaining wall, two bridges and two boardwalks. They did a great job of dealing to some very difficult obstacles. Thanks to the Wellington City Council.

2. 500 metres hasn't been gravelled yet, so please don't ride Lazy Fern after heavy rain: it would just cut it up. We hope to finish gravelling next year.

3. The track has yet to settle down. Please ride gently and avoid skidding.

4. The Koru will be an uphill only track now.

And finally, a HUGE THANK YOU to the Makara Peak Supporters, for leading this project and providing yet another great addition to the mountain bike park.

Not quite sure if it’s office fever, or the lure of pizza, but the Wednesday night sessions have been going off. This week eleven keen diggers managed to finish off two switchbacks and the 70 metres of track in between them. AWESOME!

Thanks to Geoff, Alex, Murray, John, Neil, Shane, Jabez, Mike, Matt, Nick and Jonathan… and the Makara Peak Supporters for the pizza and tools. And John for the ideal pig-out pad.

We’ll have another dig and pig evening next Wednesday. At the rate we are going the track should be open for the Makara Peak Rally in early December (6 weeks away).

Some more pics from Wednesday night

Another great after work, work party was held last night with a small but dedicated group working on switchbacks number 2 and 3, plus a huge amount of widening in between, the track is looking goood.

We still have a large amount of work to do before this track will be finished in time for December, but it is progressing well, if you feel like throwing a pick around midweek instead of a pen then come along and enjoy some good company, pizza and track satisfaction.

Some more pics of the GVN

Tuesday started of a beautiful fine day for the Global Volunteers to get out and experience some good old Kiwi track building; shame the weather crapped out on them by lunchtime. They were steadfast in there approach though and carried on through the worst of it for an hour or so in the afternoon.

Thanks for the help and hope you enjoy the rest of your stay in NZ.

The Council contractors are moving along quickly with the bridges and retain wall at the bottom of the track. Here are some before, after and during shots so we can remember what it was like before the workmen got there.

The major project is the retaining wall 100mtrs from the bottom of the track, then straight after the wall there are two bridges to go in and then further up (about halfway) they have already built two bridges.

As soon as they are finished we can start bring in gravel from the bottom of the track which will speed things up.

What more could you want from an after work track building session, good company, good progress, good pizza and good beer.

If this sounds like your kind of thing then keep a look out on the Website for more info. We will be trying to do one of these midweek work parties every week from now until December.

Wednesday was a great turnout with 8 likely lads throwing the picks around and with more daylight hours after 5pm to come it can only get more productive.

Come along and blow some steam off.

Another busy day on Lazy Fern was had on Tuesday.

The Conservation Corps led by Jonathan widened another 50 mtrs of track in the morning and then got a lesson in the afternoon on using the power barrow.

Work was done on the Swig Connector and gravel was laid on around one third of the track. This is all part of opening up the Lazy Fern track for all to ride.

On a windy, grey old day a small but effective team finished off about 200 metres of track, so we are now well into the 'Switchback Zone'.

Many thanks to Murray, Alex, Zac, Don, Ben and his kids, Rob, Steven, Ian, Grant and Alex, Malcolm, Craig, Jonathan, and the person whose name we have missed out. The standard of work was very high and will stand the test of time better than any other track we have built in the park so far.

Half the track is now gravelled, and well over half of it has been widened. The WCC will have a contractor on the job soon to build bridges and a retaining wall. The Makara Peak Supporters will continue to pay contractors to gravel the track during the week.

On Wednesday evenings there will be volunteer work parties to improve the switchbacks. Hope to see you this Wednesday after work.

This is going to be an awesome track when it is finished

A working bee last Sunday saw the first 90mtrs of Lazy Fern widened to its proper finished width of 1.2mtrs, this meant we could lay gravel down for the contractor to come in and start building the bridges and retaining wall needed to get around that nasty gully at the bottom of the track. There was also some good progress made on two of the switchback corners and some more backbreaking widening done in between. The day was not all that peaceful as we had a breaker working on a few of the rocky bits not that the 17 hardy souls that braved the nasty start to the day complained. Cheers guys.

Thursday rolled around and Jonathan, Don, Murray and Stu got to work laying the gravel down on the track, with two power barrows and a wee digger the large pile of gravel was dealt to in about 4 hours. We also managed to clean up the boggy section of the car park next to the toilet and get a well-needed load of gravel dumped and spread in that area.

Lazy Fern needs to be gravelled by December for the Makara Peak Rally and with 1.5kms of 2.2kms to go we need all the help we can get. The track still needs to be widened to its full width and that means more muscle as we cant gravel until that is done. So please if you want to come to a work party, if you have been saying for ages “I need to get out and help these guys out” then come along on the 30th of September and lend a hand, this will be the last official working bee on the track before December.

Thanks to all, and hope to see out and about.